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A financial crisis on the scale of the one that followed the Lehman Brothers collapse is unparalleled in post-war history. And we came through the crisis better than we ourselves would have thought possible. The Chancellor herself said at the beginning of the legislative period that it would be progress if, by the end of the legislative period, we were back where we had been at the start of 2008. We have succeeded in doing more than that. We had already regained that position in 2011/2012. That is a real achievement. It’s equally an achievement that we did not increase expenditure in the federal budget between 2010 and 2014. We took a disciplined approach and kept expenditure practically at a constant level over the last four years – something that was frequently not done in the past.
When we consider how confused the situation was just a year ago, it’s clear that we have made great progress. This progress remains fragile, however. That’s obvious when you consider the domestic political disputes on the Iberian peninsula, uncertainty surrounding the future development of the global economy and nervousness ahead of the Italian election. The signals from Greece are welcome. The country is now on the right track, following a period of years when there were few improvements. Our collective efforts and the perseverance of the country’s partners have helped Greece to make progress.
The French government has pointed out that, according to its own current economic forecast, it may possibly fail to meet the deficit targets. It now needs to talk to the European Commission about what this will mean under the European Stability and Growth Pact. Now that the European Commission has presented its Winter Economic Forecast, it must analyse the situations in the EU Member States. In April, the Commission will make recommendations about what should be done. We will then discuss those recommendations within the group of finance ministers. I am completely confident that France will not only stick to the European rules, but will also do everything it can to generate more growth in a difficult economic situation by carrying out structural reforms.